


Collecting Secrets

by sighingstories



Category: Boku no Hero Academia, My Hero Academia, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Fluff, Getting Together, Hero Merch, I hope this is cute, M/M, Oneshot, Pining Todoroki Shouto, Soft Boys, complete with shitty art, embarrassing encounter, shouto has a crush, shouto is a hopeless gay, shouto’s little secret, spending endeavors money to avoid feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-28
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-07-23 13:38:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20009188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sighingstories/pseuds/sighingstories
Summary: Todoroki Shouto has four things: a crush on his best friend, his dad’s credit card, a lot of Deku merch, and a strong hope that the first and third things never come to light.Except, of course they do.





	Collecting Secrets

**Author's Note:**

> Hey hi hello I’m back with another fluff oneshot! Hope y’all like it and sorry my art sucks!

Over the years, Todoroki’s classmates have learned quite a few facts about him. These facts include, but are not limited to: his dad is a dick, he loves conspiracy theories, his favorite food is zaru soba, and cats are his favorite animal. On the contrary, there are quite a few things that Todoroki keeps hidden from the rest of his class. Okay, it’s mostly just two things, but it’s not like he didn’t try to be more private about his life. It’s not his fault that when he finally learned how wonderful it is to have friends, he couldn’t resist and delight in spending time doing things other than training for once in his life. Ironically, the things he keeps hidden from others are in relation to the very first friend he made.

Is it really any surprise that Midoriya’s fanboying has rubbed off on him? In reality, Todoroki is more astonished that it hadn’t happened sooner. ‘Really,’ he thinks, ‘Midoriya probably holds the world record for the most All Might merchandise a single person owns.’ So, all in all, it’s not really all that astonishing that Todoroki started collecting hero merch, too. Well, more specifically one hero’s merchandise. Okay, one hero-in-training’s merchandise, but technicalities don’t really change the numbers that Todoroki has been racking up on his dad’s credit card for the past year. And those numbers were only climbing higher and higher as time passed. 

It all started by accident really, just a one-off impulse buy that wasn’t even supposed to be a secret. Todoroki had been looking for a birthday gift for his mother, not too long after their second year sports festival, and he just happened to pass a shop with a very interesting window display. A banner was strung across the window, proudly boasting ‘SUPPORT OUR FUTURE HEROES’ in UA’s school colors. As he took a closer look, Todoroki noticed that there was an array of merchandise themed for him and his classmates. Some of it was school related, things like ‘Property of UA’ splayed across the front of tee shirts and hoodies, his and his classmates’ names on the back. Other pieces were what caught Todoroki’s eye, though. There seemed to be multiple different items, ranging from mugs and keychains to clothing and plushies, based on the hero costumes of his friends. It made sense, given that they were often in the public eye with internships, but a little startling nonetheless. They were all still in school, not yet debuted heroes, and Todoroki couldn’t understand why anyone would want to spend their money on people who were still essentially in their trial years. Well, he couldn’t understand at first. Then he saw the Deku section in the corner of the window display, nestled between Froppy and Ingenium. He had never run into a shop faster. Overwhelmed by the amount of choices, he had decided on a pair of socks that had Midoriya’s signature bunny ears on the top and a small plush keychain the size of his palm. He had planned on giving them to Midoriya, to show him that the fanboy could now be fanboyed over, but soon became concerned that it might tip the freckled boy off to Todoroki’s little crush. Since Todoroki thought he would get over his crush on his friend if he just ignored it long enough, he assumed that it would be the only purchase and he could just keep the items as memorabilia of their high school days. Boy, was he wrong on both fronts.

Turns out, trying to ignore the fact that you’re crushing on your first and best friend is extremely hard when said crush is a literal ball of sunshine and kindness. Every little thing Midoriya did, from shy smiles and deep blushes to long-winded rambling and bounding laughs made Todoroki fall a little bit further everyday. At one point, he had realized that he might even be in love with Midoriya. However, since he still didn’t know how to deal with his feelings as well as most people, Todoroki dealt with it in the only way he could think of: keeping it to himself and spending Endeavour‘s money. Weekly, he would stop at the same shop after visiting his mother—hood up and sunglasses on in an attempt to be discreet—and purchase another piece of Deku merch. He had never been more thankful that his class received large amounts of attention, because that meant merchandise was continuously being produced. A year after he began his collection, Todoroki now had Deku items hidden in pretty much every part of his dorm room. Coffee mugs, stress balls, chopsticks, pajama sets, soba bowls, shirts, posters, and track suits could be found in dresser drawers, closets, and behind stacks of school books. He knew he had a problem, but it wasn’t hurting anyone other than his old man’s wallet, and it made him happy. Plus, it was a less nerve-racking way to express his love for Midoriya than actually telling him. If he told the real Midoriya, he could reject him; but merch Midoriya wouldn’t be able to say anything to crush his dreams when Todoroki started to sigh over green curls and scarred hands. Todoroki wasn’t sure he could handle the heartbreak that would ensue if real Midoriya found out and didn’t like him back, but this way he didn’t have to worry about what-if’s. Yet again, Todoroki would find out he was incorrect in the way he assumed things would play out. 

It was about three am on an average Thursday night when Todoroki rolled out of bed due to a sudden thirst. In his sleepy state, Todoroki surmised that a quick trip to the dorm kitchen for a cup of tea would be able to lull him back to sleep. Grabbing the mug he had left next to his futon and shuffling on his slippers, he made his way downstairs. Still half asleep, Todoroki thought nothing of the fact that the kitchen light was on. His tired brain supplied an excuse, assuming that someone had forgotten to turn it off. It wasn’t until he rounded the corner that he woke up just enough to realize that his sleepy brain was a dumb traitor. 

Green eyes looked up at Todoroki from a mug of hot cocoa, adjusting slowly to the figure in from of them.

“Couldn’t sleep either, Todoroki-kun? Wanna join—oh, wow!”

Todoroki stood, bathed in the light of the kitchen. It was when Midoriya’s eyes widened from half-lidded and sleepy to wide and in awe that he realized he made a mistake, the jig was up. Standing in front of Midoriya himself, Todoroki was wearing his favorite Deku pajama set, had green Deku bunny slippers on his feet, and was holding a Deku-themed mug. He closed his eyes and willed this entire encounter to just be an awful nightmare, but was brought to the conclusion that this was, in fact, reality by a concerned voice.

“Todoroki-kun? You okay? You don’t look so good.. Do you need to go to Recovery Girl?” Todoroki was standing in front of his crush, head-to-toe in merchandise of said boy, and yet Midoriya was concerned that he was ill. How could he not fall for this boy? 

“I’m not ill, Midoriya. Just a little embarrassed,” Todoroki sighed, staring at the ceiling.

“Embarrassed? About wha—OH! No, Todoroki-kun! Why would you be embarrassed about having merchandise of our classmates? I mean I definitely need to go get some, so you’ll have to tell me where you got it.. but I think it’s really nice that you support your friends!” 

Maybe it was because Todoroki was exhausted, or maybe it was because Midoriya’s sweet voice had some type of strange effect on his brain function, but Shouto shook his head at his best friend.

“No, Midoriya. I didn’t buy merch for all of our friends. Just yours.” Todoroki blushed, cursing his body for being thirsty. If he hadn’t come down for tea, none of this would’ve happened. Midoriya wouldn’t know that Todoroki owned these things and life would’ve gone on, but here he is now, regretting everything that led him to this point.

“O-oh!” Midoriya squeaked, also blushing, “that—that’s so kind of you, Todoroki-kun! I-I’m really flattered, truly, thank you!” Midoriya gave a slight bow, still blushing. Todoroki blinked. Did he hear that right? He isn’t telling Todoroki that he’s odd? Sure, Todoroki hadn’t actually confessed the complete depth of his feelings, but this felt hopeful and not at all like rejection. Midoriya seemed truly sincere.

“I’m glad, Midoriya. If you’d like, you can accompany me this weekend to the shop. We can go to that ice-cream parlor you were talking about to Uraraka-san yesterday, too.” Midoriya starting nodding so fast that Todoroki was concerned his head might fly off of his neck, but then he abruptly stopped and blushed even deeper.

“L-like a date, Todoroki-kun?” he inquired, speaking so softly it was almost a whisper. Todoroki tried to think fast. If he said yes and Midoriya rejected him, he would lose his best friend; but, if he said yes and Midoriya agreed to go on a date with him.. well, he would be on cloud nine. 

“Yes, if that’s all right with you?”

Lights reflected in Midoriya’s eyes as he nodded furiously again.

“Yes! That would be great, Todoroki-Kun! Plus, then I could buy some Shouto merch at the shop!” Midoriya stated, smiling brightly. At the idea of Midoriya wearing his merch, Todoroki simultaneously blushed and dropped his mug, shattering it. His hair may have also started smoking a bit, not that he would ever admit to that.

Midoriya laughed, the corners of his sleepy eyes crinkling. 

“And we’ll pick up another one of those, too.”

  


**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed that! Come talk to me on twitter if you want! @dekukins


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